So much for so little

And for the general consumer, there is now this for hard disk space….2 terabytes (2,000 gigabytes).  Not so long ago, only huge corporations could afford the purchase and maintenance costs.  Now, a regular guy who is into movies could get one of these.   I go back a ways – I started with computers with … Read more

This looks encouraging

From TreeHugger comes this report: Thanks to a merger, a New Jersey company hopes to be able to provide solar power at prices competitive with traditional electricity without relying on rebates. WorldWater & Power intends to acquire Entech, a manufacturer of concentrating solar photovoltaic technology. Entech has developed concentrator solar power systems, supplied solar power … Read more

CCAGW 2005 Congressional Ratings

Press Release
Washington, D.C. – The Council for Citizens Against Government Waste (CCAGW) today released its 2005 Congressional Ratings.  For 17 years, CCAGW has examined roll-call votes to separate the taxpayer advocates in Congress from those who favor wasteful programs and pork-barrel spending. 
The 2005 Congressional Ratings cover the voting year 2005, or the first session of the 109th Congress.  CCAGW rated 34 key votes in the House and 24 key votes in the Senate.  Votes included a budget reconciliation bill that will save a $39.7 billion over five years in mandatory programs, a tax reconciliation bill that would protect the tax cuts passed in 2001 and 2003, reforms in class action lawsuits, the Central America Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA), and affirming the Base Realignment and Closure Commission (BRAC) recommendations. 
The entire House had an average of 45 percent a six point increase over 2004.   House Republicans averaged 73 percent; House Democrats averaged 13 percent.  The entire Senate had an average of 46 percent also a six point increase over 2004.  Senate Republicans averaged 68 percent; Senate Democrats averaged 18 percent. 
There were two Taxpayer Super Heroes with a score of 100 percent:  Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.) in the Senate and Ed Royce (R-Calif.) in the House.  Taxpayer Heroes are members who scored between 80 and 99 percent.  The total number of Heroes and Super Heroes in the House dropped from 59 in 2004 to 52 in 2005.  The number of Heroes and Super Heroes in the Senate remained the same at 10. 
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“Talk is cheap,” CCAGW President Tom Schatz said.  “The voting record is the best way to measure a member’s commitment to fiscal discipline.  Unlike the Taxpayer Super Heroes and Heroes, too many members of Congress demonstrate little regard for the harmfull effects of a large and cumbersome federal government.”
CCAGW’s website features the complete 2005 Congressional Ratings, including vote descriptions, scorecards for the House and Senate, personalized scorecards for each member of Congress, historical comparisons, and averages by chamber, party, and state delegation.  Visit www.cagw.org 
The Council for Citizens Against Government Waste is the lobbying arm of Citizens Against Government Waste, the nation’s largest nonpartisan, nonprofit organization dedicated to eliminating waste, fraud, abuse, and mismanagement in government.

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Democrat Vision: “A New Era of Braveness Internationally”

Consider the nightmare vision, as presented by House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi as she addressed the 97th annual NAACP convention July 18th: Democrats are proposing a New Direction to take our country forward for all Americans, not just the privileged few. And when we do take back the Congress, the Congressional Black Caucus will lead … Read more

Those pesky American Engineers…..

Three guys – a farmer, Osama bin Laden, and an American engineer are together one day.  They come across a lantern and a genie pops out of it. "I will give each of you one wish, which is three wishes total" says the genie. The farmer says, "I am a farmer, my dad was a … Read more

The Vatican has it wrong

Update 1:

The Pope has spoken out on the situation (from Reuters again):

July 17, 2006 — INTROD, Italy – Pope Benedict yesterday condemned Hezbollah’s "terrorist acts" and Israel’s "reprisals," calling the cross-border violence unjustifiable.

In his first public comments on the crisis, he said the violations at its root cannot be used to sanction bloodshed. He called for a resumption of dialogue.

"The causes of such fierce confrontation are, unfortunately, objective situations of violation of law and justice," the pope said from his holiday retreat in the Aosta Valley.

 In my eyes, this is still only 1/2 right.  Hezbollah (or however one wishes to spell it) started this current instance.  Israel, in the past, has ignored most of the past infractions, but has finally (and rightfully) decided to protect its citizens.

There are a number of commenters out in the ‘Sphere that has said the same thing so I will apply it here.  What if it was the case that Italy had entered the Vatican and kidnapped a couple of the Swiss Guards?  What if Italy was lobbing shells or rockets into the Vatican proper?

And if the Vatican had been been under attack for the last 60 years?

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Then what are all those blue helmets doing that are already there?

UN chief  appeals to Israel and Hexbollah to focus their targets narrowly, to spare civilian lives.

Does anyone else see what’s wrong with this picture?  Isn’t Hezbollah known for shooting off records heading into Israeli civilian area? 

Now the UN is trying to get into the act over at the Israeli – Lebanon border.  From this report (H/T: Lucienne.com) at the Middle East Online, Secretary General Annan is trying to get a peace keeping force in there:

UN chief Kofi Annan called Monday for an end to hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah in order to buy time to put a well-armed "stabilisation force" along the Lebanon-Israel border.

Problem is, they are already there.  So what have they done to help "calm the waters" so far?

The United Nations has a monitoring force on the Lebanese-Israeli border known as UNIFIL, which was set up in March 1978 to oversee an Israeli withdrawal from southern Lebanon that finally only took place 22 years later.

It is made up of 2,000 soldiers and 500 civilians mandated to supervise a ceasefire on the border but is largely powerless. Its mandate, renewed every six months by the Security Council, next expires on July 31

Nothing.  But wait, there’s more!

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I thought I was working for my family….

From the American Spectator: Americans finally have stopped working for government. Many people are familiar with "Tax Freedom Day" — April 26th this year — when they effectively finish paying their taxes. But with government running huge deficits and imposing massive regulatory requirements, we all spend a lot more time working for government. Cost of … Read more

Jump for Global Warming

I realize that Doug and I posted two jokes today (without knowing what the other was doing).  I give you this – not a joke, but humorous (I hope).

Folks, I can’t make this up….and perhaps we should have a Ridiculous / Scratch Head catagory…but someone is dead serious about it.  From ABC News:

July 17, 2006 — Hans Peter Niesward, from the Department of Gravitationsphysik at the ISA in Munich, says we can stop global warming in one fell swoop — or, more accurately, in one big jump.

The slightly disheveled professor states his case on WorldJumpDay.org, an Internet site created to recruit 600,000,000 people to jump simultaneously on July 20 at 11:39:13 GMT in an effort to shift Earth’s position.

I don’t even know how or what to say about this…..for once, I’m speechless.  So, let’s let the trainwreck continue….

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Is the MSM American? How about pro-American?

At first take, most would say yes, at least to the first.  Many, myself included, and if you are a frequent user of the Internet or a listen to talk shows, you probably would be included to say no.

I generally form my opinions by reviewing a number on the ‘Net  and then try to cross check a nugget of information against multiple sources for validity. Often, as I have found out, first blushes are wrong, yet get corrected quickly at the better sites. Your mileage may vary in the sites you use (and again, thanks for visiting us!). 

Getting info from the major (ABC, NBC, CBS) networks – not at all.  Frankly, I don’t believe that they are "just reporting the news".  Rather, they are trying to shape the news, without telling us of that mission.

Here’s my problem. We are a conservative blog site, and we make no bones about it. We are also pro-America and delight in the wonders of this country and the freedoms it affords us all. Anything that we write, the reader should keep these two items in the background.  We put that out front so that everyone will know.

The MSM outlets…..they continue to preach that they only report the news.

Oh really?  What about this? 

 Snitper shooting at Americans

Photographer: Jaoo Silver 

A sniper loyal to Shiite cleric Mogtada al Sadr fires towards U.S. positions in the cemetary in Najaf, Iraq.

Michelle McNally: "Right there with the Mahdi Army.  Incredible Courage." 

Now for my beef….I think that this is despicable!  (H/T: Little Green Footballs)

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Frequent Flyer

I used to do a lot of flying…a LOT of flying.  First for Digital Equipment in the early to mid 80’s and then again with my present company from the late 90’s up to about a year ago.  How much?  For a few years, I was a member of United’s Premier Executive level.  Kinda nice, … Read more

Discrimination can be done by anyone

"They that live by the sword will die by the sword." Or, should I use "Those that live in glass houses…"?  This report from Boston.com kinda says it all. PROVINCETOWN — Town leaders here are holding a public meeting today to air concerns about slurs and bigoted behavior. And this time, they say, it’s gay … Read more

Living Wage

We’ll be commenting in the future about the "living wage" – especially why it is such a dunderheaded idea from a purely economic standpoint.

Be that as it may, what happens when activists and politicians are trying to ram something down the marketplace’s throat, and the marketplace decides to not play, pick up its ball and  go home? In Maryland, a law was passed that essentially targets Wal-Mart to force it to pay health care benefits to its norms (and the union activists behind the law, sore that all efforts so far to unionize Wal-Mart have failed).  I’ve been waiting to see what Wal-Mart was going to do.

Then this came up – from the Chicago-Sun Times:

 Target is putting plans to build three South Side stores "on hold" — and making veiled threats to close existing Chicago stores — if the City Council mandates wage and benefit standards for "big-box" retailers, African-American aldermen warned Thursday.

Uh-oh, the retailers, I think, have been pushed to far.  Why Target?  Well, it’s not just Target, it is any big retailer that fits this:

The saber-rattling is intensifying as the clock winds down toward a July 26 showdown vote on plans to make Chicago the nation’s first major city to establish a "living wage" for stores with at least 90,000 square feet of space operated by retailers with $1 billion in sales.

Here we go with the "living wage" meme again.  This is "playing chicken" in the economic sense – who is going to blink first?  My bet is the politicians.  Why?  They can only control what is within their jurisdiction – they are helpless if the retailer moves out….and then they will have to discuss the ramification with their angry constituents (some of whom will lose their jobs).  Why do I think this is likely?

Here’s the reason:

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City & Town. Voters & Tax Caps.

Besides public employee salary and benefit costs, nothing impacts local property taxes more than big construction projects like new $chools, mammoth libraries, and police $tation megaplexes. Throughout the state, and indeed the entire country, we see massive projects proposed or under way. Why not? The economy is good right now. People seemingly have enough money to continue paying the ever-rising cost of funding their government. Or do they? How often do we hear the liberal Democrats and their comrades in the news media tell us that the “Bush economy” only benefits the rich and leaves “the little guy” losing ground as their costs grow faster than paycheck raises? Perhaps one reason there may be a grain of truth to that notion is that the fiscal backsliding is being caused in large part by people’s ever-growing tax burden.
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Can it be that ordinary folks are beginning to understand that their local governments have a spending problem that finds tax bills digging deeper into their weekly paychecks? Let’s look at the “tale of two cities” if you will- Laconia and Gilford (actually, a town). Both locales have recently passed initiatives aimed at either directly, or indirectly, slowing the pace of government growth. In both, “It [is] the best of times, it [is] the worst of times.”

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I’ve heard of “Land for Peace”…

as that’s all we’ve heard for decades – give the Paestinians Gaza and the West Bank so they can have their own state.  I don’t think anyone is generally against the two state idea, except the Palestinians and their supporters.  As I pointed out here and here (and lots of places out in the blogosphere), … Read more

Ruminations on 7/13/06

As I wander around the ‘Net….. Couple of years ago, this was just an idea.  This past year, three worked.  Now, mountain climbing?  I kinda like this idea of promoting solar energy.  However: While a handful of US states still lack almost any meaningful incentives for encouraging citizens to generate power for their homes and … Read more

An example where money does not equal quality

I saw this over at Betsy’s Page a couple of days ago – I just didn’t have the time to really review it then.  I urge you to read it in its entirety as it shows examples of why just throwing money at a problem isn’t going to solve it.  Continuing on with the current state of affairs, procedures, and staffing isn’t going to solve these quality problems either. 

I have to admit – I may be taking our Education establishment to task here in my town of Gilford, but when I look at the amounts of money and the lack of results, putting things into context says Gilford ain’t so bad (but I will continue to "task" Gilford to reach for excellence). 

All these parents is what they feel is best for their kids – a good education.  They want the control back from the school system – they want institutions that can be held accountable.

Clint Bolick writes in the Wall Street Journal (subscription req’d) about a suit being filed in Newark, NJ seeking to give 60,000 students trapped in failing schools by giving their parents the money to transfer their children out of the horrible schools to attend schools of their choice.

Seeking to vindicate the state constitutional guarantee of a "thorough and efficient" education, the plaintiffs in Crawford v. Davy ask that children be allowed to leave public schools where fewer than half of the students pass the state math and language literacy assessments that measure educational proficiency; and that the parents of these children be permitted to take the pro rata share of the public money spent on their children, to seek better opportunities in other public or private schools. Supporting the families are three prominent New Jersey groups: the Black Ministers Council, the Latino Leadership Alliance, and Excellent Education for Everyone.

Sounds like groups that care more about students’ education than the public school teachers’ union.

Sounds familiar, right? 

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Need, want, or braggadocio?

UPDATE 2:  That there’s funny One man’s take on the issue. ==========================  UPDATE 1: It was pointed out to me that my dimensions for the football field were off.  Ed Engler at the Laconia Daily Sun has pointed out that "a regulation football field is 360-ft. X 160-ft.. . .a total of 57,600 square feet. … Read more

And you think universal health care is good?

"Universal Healthcare" seems to be a mantra we hear – millions without health insurance!  "How can we, the lone superpower, do this to our people!" are splayed across the pages. All we have to do is look at other Anglosphere countries that have it.  Look at Canada – their medical professionals are coming here to … Read more

I thought teaching meant education

I’d really rather not concentrate on the education establishment, I really don’t.  However, when they keep putting themselves up front and into the news, what else can I do? A lot of talk shows and blog sites talk often about the "dumbing down of America".  We older folks see it in the younger generation.  Heck, … Read more

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